1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to the detection and evaluation of multiple imbalances within multi-parametric systems, particularly to the employment of graphic means for performing such detections and evaluations. It is particularly useful in the field of medicine for the diagnosis and follow-up treatment of diseases. It may be used in many other fields for evaluating, diagnosing, predicting, analyzing, describing behavior, change of behavior, etc., where multiple parameters in a related system are involved.
2. Description of Prior Art
In medicine, for optimal care and therapy, quantitative as well as qualitative judgments of the degrees of abnormalities should be made when diagnosing patients. Previous studies have suggested that an analysis of combinations of laboratory data of a patient may be of greater aid in understanding the patient's condition than an analysis of individual items of data per se.
Heretofore one scientific method of diagnosing diseases from laboratory data has used a statistical analysis of deviations of a patient's data from a normal range. The results obtained were arranged in the form of a circular coordinate system which employed radial axes-calibrated according to the patient's laboratory parameters, with standard deviations of each parameter plotted on the respective axes. Following this, a pattern was created by interconnecting adjacent points on the axes. Diagnosis was performed by comparing the obtained pattern of an individual patient with reference patterns typical for certain diseases. J. H. Siegel, "Relations Between Circulatory and Metabolic Changes in Sepsis," 32 Ann.Rev.Med. (Annual Reviews, Inc. 1981) 175-194; also see the "Patient Data System," General Electric Medical Systems (adv't.), Critical Care Medicine, Jan/Feb 1976.
While useful, these methods did not provide sufficient information for one to detect pathology with normal data and did not reveal qualitative and quantitative types of imbalances between parameters.
Another method has been suggested in an attempt to overcome these difficulties. This method was similar to the previous ones: a circular type presentation of parameters on radial axes was provided with values plotted on the radial axes, but expressed as a percentage of normal values, rather than by standard deviations. S. Nazari et al., "A Multivariable Pattern for Nutritional Assessment," 4 J. Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition 499, 1980.
This method provided more distinguishable patterns than the previous one because the percentage scale was more sensitive than the standard deviation scale. Nevertheless this method still did not provide sufficient information for one to obtain quantative and qualitative types of imbalances between parameters and did not reveal any multiple imbalances which were present within the system.